Bought By Hate
by InfiniteDevotion
Summary: After her parents were murdered 15 years ago, Lilah has hated the man that killed them ever since. But will an unexpected encounter make her doubt her feelings, and cause new ones to stir?
1. Nightmares and Peppermint

**Bought from Hate**

_**By MyFiniteMercy**_

_Dedicated to My Endless Love... for her wonderful influence in my life_

**Summary:** After her parents were murdered 15 years ago, Lilah has hated the man that killed them ever since. But will an unexpected encounter make her doubt her feelings, and cause new ones to stir?

**Disclaimer:** All recognisable characters belong to JK Rowling. Lilah and the plot belong to me. :D

**Chapter 1. Nightmares and Peppermint**

Lilah Freeman jerked awake from the all too real dream, sweat pouring off her body in rivers, and her hair plastered to her face and neck. The sheets on the bed had twisted around her body as she tossed and turned whilst she slept, and were now warm, sticky and damp from her sweat.

The room around her was black. As it was every single night. Untangling herself from the mess of sheets and quilts, she pushed the hair back from her face and stood up off the bed, glancing at the clock on the bedside table as she did so. 2.28. _Damn_, she thought. _There goes another night._ _Another night with no sleep._ Every night for the last 15 years, Lilah had been plagued with nightmares of the night her parents were murdered before her eyes by Death Eaters.

No. Not Death Eaters. Death _Eater._ One Death Eater.

The image of white-blonde hair and stormy grey eyes raced through her mind, and a single name spilled from her lips in a disgusted hiss.

"Lucius Malfoy."

The one man who had single handedly Crucioed Jason and Marie Freeman and then, with a look of complete boredom, killed them. All with 15 year old Lilah watching from a nearby cupboard, rage and terror coursing through her veins.

Shaking her head, Lilah returned to the world around her, and found herself crumpled on the ground with tears coursing down her cheeks. Using a shaking hand, she wiped the offending moisture away and stood up again on unsteady legs. She stumbled into the bathroom, flicking the light on as she moved past. Her eyes shut quickly as the harsh fluorescent light flooded the bathroom and into her unadjusted eyes. After a few moments, she opened her eyes again and walked over to the basin.

She looked in the mirror and inwardly gasped at what she saw. A face with skin flushed pink all the way down toher neck, and red bloodshot eyes. Tear tracks down hercheeks which weresticky from sweat, and hair hanging loosely from dampness. _I shouldn't be surprised. This is what I see every single night. _She sighed and turned the tap on, splashing her face with the cold water. She hoped, just as she hoped every night, that the water would wash away the memories...and the nightmares.

As the water dripped down her neck, cooling the skin there, she remembered that night. The night of her 13th birthday. 15 years ago.

**-Flashback-**

"_Hide in there, Lilah," her mother, Marie had said, motioning to the wardrobe behind her. "Stay there, and don't come out, whatever happens. Promise me that you will stay!"_

_Lilah had tried arguing, but the tears in both of their eyes and the 'don't argue, just do it' look on Marie's face silenced Lilah almost instantly. As they shared a quick hug, the front door of the house came crashing down, the sound reverberating through the whole house. Lilah found herself being roughly pushed into the wardrobe, and the door hastily closed behind her. She turned around quickly and gazed out into the room through the gap between the doors, and gasped at the sight._

_A single man stood in the centre of the room, gazing at Marie and Jason. The man had platinum blonde hair hanging halfway down his back, stetting a sharp contrast with the jet black robes he wore. His face looked as though it was made from marble, with sharp cheekbones, stormy grey eyes and lips twisted in a smirk. _

"_I'm only going to ask once." He raised his wand at the statement. "Where is she?"_

_Silence followed the question, resulting in a silent curse being thrown at Lilah's parents. They fell to the floor in pain, their screams echoing across the room, and causing tears to spill from Lilah's eyes. For minutes, they kept screaming and writhing in pain. The smirk on the man's face had slipped, and had been replaced by a look of utter boredom. _

_He ended the curse, and was met with sharp gasps and pants. "Please," Marie begged, "please, no more, Malfoy, no more! We don't know where she is!"_

_Malfoy sighed. "I grow tired of this. I will ask one more time. Where is she?"_

_Jason groaned in pain. "We don't know," he ground out._

"_Very well."_

_Another silent curse was flung at the pair on the floor, and green light flooded the room. When the light faded, Malfoy was gone, Jason and Marie lay on the ground, green and blue eyes staring lifelessly up at the ceiling. Lilah bit into her fist to stop herself from screaming in agony at the death of her parents. _

**-End Flashback-**

She rinsed her face again with cold water, stemming the flow of tears. Drying her face on one of the fluffy white towels on the racks next to the basin, she wiped away all moisture, leaving no trace that it was ever there. She stood in the bathroom, on the cold tiles, staring at a point on the wall, letting the heat from her skin fade away.

Once the heat had left her skin, Lilah walked back into her bedroom, still dark from when she was woken by the dream. She passed the bed without a second glance, not wanting to lay in the damp sheets. She walked over to an armchair next to the window instead, the chair she curled up in every night after recovering from the shock of her nightmares.

As Lilah remembered, her eyes became watery, and her breathing hitched. However, the thing that bothered her most now, a decade and a half after the day she had been forced to watch from the wardrobe was not the death of her parents.

No. Instead, it was an aroma. A smell that she carried with her at the back of her mind everywhere she went, hoping to catch another whiff of it so that she might avenge her parents. The smell of the man who destroyed her life.

Peppermint and leather.

**Author's Note: Alright I finally got this down on paper! This if my first fanfic, so if there are any flaws, they should be picked up by you brilliant readers :D**

**Song of the moment: _Happiness_ – Alexis Jordan**

**MyFiniteMercy**

**Beta's Note: the writer is gay and an absolute queer ! :) but well, hope you guys enjoyed the chapter as much as I did – and stay tuned for more.**


	2. Encounters and Horror

**Bought from Hate**

_**By MyFiniteMercy**_

_Dedicated to My Endless Love... for her wonderful influence in my life_

**Summary:** After her parents were murdered 15 years ago, Lilah has hated the man that killed them ever since. But will an unexpected encounter make her doubt her feelings, and cause new ones to stir?

**Disclaimer:** All recognisable characters belong to JK Rowling. Lilah and the plot belong to me. :D

**Chapter 2: Encounters and Horror**

Lilah awoke with a start to hear the blazing siren of her alarm clock. Glancing at it quickly, she saw that she was late for work at Flourish and Blotts. _Shit, _she thought, quickly silencing the alarm. _If this happens again, I'm going to get fired._ Just like every other morning whenshe woke up after her nightmares and the breakdown that came afterwards, she slept through her alarms and was late for work. As a result of rushing around to try and get to work at a reasonable time, she didn't have time to get something to eat; she rushed a shower, not bothering to try and deal with her frizzy auburn hair –instead she placed a quick smooth and straight charm to tame the locks- and hurriedly threw on her work robes and apparated to the book shop.

At the bookshop, her boss was not so understanding about the situation that Lilah was in.

"Don't let it happen again," her boss, Jake said. "If it does, you will have to find yourself another job."

Lilah bowed her head obediently. "Yes sir."

With a nod of his head, Jake went away to continue serving customers at the counter of the shop, where the line was starting to get a bit out of control. Witches and wizards with piles of books in their arms were lined up almost to the door of the shop, making any sort of movement within, very difficult.

Lilah walked to the back of the shop, to where the new arrivals box was. Opening it, she picked up 3 books and sat down at her desk to start cataloguing them.

Volume after volume passed through her hands as she swiftly processed all the new books, making a new pile out of the books that had to go on the shelves. The tomes that had to get put on Jake's desk for further processing went in another pile, so they wouldn't get mixed up with those to go on the shelves.

Once they were all sorted out, Lilah started to find where they went on the shelves that were already full with other volumes and tomes. She had been asked on many occasions why she didn't just use her wand to make easy work of the mundane task. "Because it gives me something to do, and I like the work," was her reply every single time.

Book after book went on the shelves, crammed in with countless other volumes so that the shelves on which they sat were close to thebreaking point. It was at this point that Lilah _did_ use her wand, conjuring up a number of new bookcases and placing them in the spaces on the wall not already covered by other bookcases.

By the time she had finished placing all of the new arrivals on the shelves, several hours had passed, the sun low over the shops in Diagon Alley. There were almost no other people in the bookshop, other then herself and Jake.

"It's just about time to close up shop, Lilah," Jake called over to her from the other end of the shop, where he was taking down displays from the front window.

Lilah called back a response, not turning from what she was doing, but it was lost at the sound of the tinkling door bell, signalling the arrival of a customer to the shop. That was when he aroma hit her. Sharp and spicy, yet dull at the same time.

Peppermint and leather.

Gasping in horror, she dropped the bookshe was holding and quickly grasped the shelf in front of her for support. There was only one person that she knew who had that aroma. But, desperate for the memory to pass, she hoped to Merlin that it was someone totally different.

"Good afternoon, sir. How may I help you this fine afternoon?" Jake was in shopkeeper mode now, greeting the person in the hopes of getting a good sale.

A graceful drawl met Lilah's ears. The very same drawl that had haunted her memories for the past 15 years. "Oh, I just came to have a look at your wares."

Forgetting the things she had left to do, she quickly let go of the shelf, and rushed to the door in desperate need of fresh air. However, she was met by an immovable wall of finely tailored robes. In fact, they were the most finely tailored robes she had ever seen in her entire life, jet black in colour. Instinctively, she grasped onto the robes for support, the aroma of peppermint and leather overwhelming her senses.

"Well, well. What have we here?"

Lilah breathed deeply to try and remove the intoxicating aroma from her senses, but only managed to inhale more of it into her system. She held onto the robes even tighter, burying her head in them, and refusing to accept the reality of the situation.

_He is NOT here...he is NOT here..._

But despite her persistent denials, strong hands dripped her upper arms and slowly removed her from his chest. "I can assure you, miss," he said in that bored drawl of his, "I am most certainly _here,_ as you so elegantly put it." His words were laced with sarcasm.

Not realising she had clamped her eyes shut at the horror of the situation, she slowly opened them and looked at a point on the wall behind the man's face. But Lilah knew that she would have to look at him sooner or later. _In this case, later seems like a more suitable option._ But the man was determined to make her look at him. He released one of her arms, and used the hand to tilt her head so that she was looking directly at him. As soon as his hand touched her chin, she shut her eyes again straight away.

Peppermint and leather stormed her senses.

When she slowly opened them again, she was greeted by the grey, stormy eyes of Lucius Malfoy.

**Author's Note: YAAAY The next chapter is done.. I hope all you readers enjoy it as much as I did writing it! :D Anyways, if anyone gets a chance to review, please give a shout to my beta, My Endless Love, who has done a great job of perfecting these chapters for me!**

**Until the next chapter 3**

**MyFiniteMercy**

**Beta's Note: review! -hands out large supplies of cookies- **


	3. Breakdowns and Confusion

**Bought from Hate**

_**By MyFiniteMercy**_

_Dedicated to My Endless Love... for her wonderful influence in my life_

**Summary:** After her parents were murdered 15 years ago, Lilah has hated the man that killed them ever since. But will an unexpected encounter make her doubt her feelings, and cause new ones to stir?

**Disclaimer:** All recognisable characters belong to JK Rowling. Lilah and the plot belong to me. :D

_**Recap: When she slowly opened them again, she was greeted by the grey, stormy eyes of Lucius Malfoy.**_

**Chapter 3: Breakdowns and Confusion**

Lilah's hands grasped harder onto the crisp black robes in front of her. Silent sobs racked her slim shoulders and tears streamed down her flushed cheeks. "No!" She whispered. "No way in _hell_ is he here RIGHT NOW! Not when I have tried so hard to get over it!"

Hiding the shock from his face, Lucius Malfoy quickly let go of the woman breaking down before him, and shot a questioning look at the shopkeeper, Will, who just shrugged his shoulders and continued taking down the displays in the windows.

The blonde aristocrat turned back to the sobbing woman still clinging to his chest, at a loss for what to do. He tried to comfort her by patting her back awkwardly, but all she did was squirm out of reach while trying as hard as possible to hold onto the robes in her hands. "Excuse me, madam, but are you alright?" Although there were traces of the sarcastic drawl in his voice, the question was sincere.

Upon hearing the voice of the man who haunted her dreams, Lilah quickly let go of the robes in front of her and stepped backwards - once, twice, three times - until her back hit the nearest bookshelf. Her head hung low, and try as she might, the tears just wouldn't stop flowing. She refused to acknowledge the presence of the man in front of her, despite the terror coursing through her veins.

"As much as I appreciate the release of your grip upon my person, my question remains. Are you _quite_ alright?"

Once the words sunk in, Lilah quickly wiped the tears from her cheeks and willed for their flow to stop. She allowed a few moments to calm her racing heart and to steady her erratic breathing.

"Yes, thank you sir. I thing I'm alright now." In her mind, she was screaming profanities at the blonde man in front of her. _Bloody death eater, stole my family away from me..._ She turned to the side so that se wouldn't have to stare into the genuinely concerned, stormy grey eyes fixed on her own chocolate brown orbs.

Malfoy was smoothing down the front of his robes when a flash of recognition burst through his mind. _I've seen her before, I'm sure of it. But where...?_ But for the sake of appearances, his cold expression and bored drawl came back. "I'm very glad_,_" his words dripping with sarcasm, "that you have found your..." He paused here, searching for the right word. "_Comfort_. But if you don't mind, I would like to purchase the book that I came to this miserable shop for."

At hearing his hurtful statement, something inside Lilah snapped.

"How dare you." Her head was lowered, and her shoulders were shaking again. But instead of shaking with sobs, she was shaking in rage. "How _dare_ you. You think you can just waltz in here, demanding whatever you please, totally disregarding what the people in the environment around you are doing or feeling. Just your _presence_ in -how did you put it?- this miserable shop is enough to stir the worst memories in people." Her voice had risen from dangerously low to a rage-filled scream; her face was red, and tears were streaming down her cheeks once more. Her chocolate eyes blazed with anger.

All traces of the man who had just stood there and let her cry on his chest was gone. Even all the traces of boredom and indifference had disappeared. Now, his face was deathly pale, one eyebrow raised so high that Lilah wondered if it would vanish into the platinum blonde hairline. He stalked up to her, causing her to step backwards into the bookshelf at her back. He continued to step closer to her, until he was looming over her.

His spicy aroma flooded her senses once again, causing her to reel with dizziness. But she persevered, grabbing the shelf behind her for support and steadily gazed into his smouldering stormy eyes. The raised eyebrow slowly descended to its place next to its brother.

"Look, witch. Whatever I may have done to you or someone you know is in the past. But I am here _NOW. _Whether you like it or not. Now. If you DON'T mind, I would like to be served RIGHT THIS SECOND." His voice, like Lilah's, had started as a deadly whisper, and raised to an infuriated bellow.

This shout caused Lilah to flinch in fear, her eyes shutting quickly and a small whimper to escape from her lips. She tried as hard as humanly possible to shrink into herself, and wished that the floor would be kind enough to open up and swallow her right there and then.

Unfortunately for her, the floor wasn't nearly so obliging.

Upon hearing the whimper fall from the lips of the woman in front of him, remnants of the ruthless Death Eater that he once was pushed to the surface. A malevolent smirk formed on his lips and he leered down at the woman cowering in fear before him.

Lilah saw the anger on his face leech out and be replaced by a look of complete malice; stormy eyes that were smouldering stopped, and started glinting with bitter enjoyment. Unable to bear the brunt of his stare, she sunk to the floor and hung her head, hoping that it was all just a new nightmare.

When she crumpled in front of the man before her, the flash of recognition flashed through his mind once more. _I have seen this before._

And then it hit him.

He had seen almost the exact same woman break down like this a long time ago. _15_ _years ago._ Was it? Was there even the slightest possibility that this woman on the floor at his feet was the daughter of the family he had murdered so heartlessly? Looking back at the man and woman who had lain on the floor of their living room all those years ago, he could see similarities; the auburn coloured hair, the heart shaped face.

Then it hit him, hard. This sobbing woman, with the familiar face and hair, as well as the same fiery personality he had only encountered once before.

This was the daughter of Jason and Marie Freeman. The one who had eluded him on that night.

Lilah could almost feel the tension around the two of them. She looked up and saw the questioning eyes of the man above her.

He spoke two words, his voice so low that she had to strain to catch them.

"Lilah...Freeman?"

**Author's Note: Wow. This was a hard one to get down on paper... I hope I got the character of Lucius right, cos I think that I made him too nice...anyways let me know what you think :D BTW, the site is being a bit weird and not letting me post up anything at all, including chapters and new stories... I hope it fixes itself soon. **

**Until the next chapter 3**

**MFM**

**PS. MyEndlessLove is having a little beta's holiday (pffft.) so I had to do this one on my own. If any of you guys pick up any mistakes, it would be greatly appreciated if you could point them out :D**


	4. Run and Hide

**Bought from Hate**

_**By MyFiniteMercy**_

_Dedicated to My Endless Love... for her wonderful influence in my life_

**Summary:** After her parents were murdered 15 years ago, Lilah has hated the man that killed them ever since. But will an unexpected encounter make her doubt her feelings, and cause new ones to stir?

**Disclaimer:** All recognisable characters belong to JK Rowling. Lilah and the plot belong to me. :D

_**Recap: He spoke two words, his voice so low that she had to strain to catch them.**_

"_**Lilah...Freeman?"**_

**Chapter 4: Run and Hide**

As soon as she heard her name falling from the lips of the man standing above her, Lilah's head shot up to gaze fearfully into his stormy grey eyes. Not wanting to know what he was going to do, she leapt up and sprinted out of the shop with tears coursing down her cheeks and sobs wracking her shoulders.

She flew past him so quickly that he had to stand aside so as not to be bowled over. After she had ran out the door, the bell still ringing, he just stood there, his eyes fixed on that one spot where she had been sitting. Sitting, and looking up at him with those pleading, chocolate eyes. Her auburn hair framing her pale, tear-streaked face.

He looked up to see Will standing there, staring at him with a look he couldn't quite decipher. But it disturbed him that he had instilled such a reaction in someone he had never seen before, even if he had had such a significant effect on their life. Sure, he had been greeted by similar reactions on other occasions, but never as severe as that. And what was scaring him the most was not the fact that he had felt good about it.

It was the fact that he was feeling guilt about what he had felt when he saw the woman...no, _Lilah_, staring at him with such helplessness.

He knew that things were not as they should be. He knew that if he was feeling _sorry, _then things were definitely not right.

Lucius Malfoy feeling remorse. That was something that the world hadn't known for a long time. Not since before the rise of Voldemort.

Suddenly feeling very claustrophobic, he sent a passive glance at Will, who was till staring at him with that same odd look on his face, and walked out of the shop, shoulders straight and brow creased in thought. Once outside, he glanced around quickly, looking for _her,_ and, upon not finding her anywhere in sight, sighed and disapparated to Malfoy Manor.

O...O...O...O

Lilah, after running out of the shop and leaving behind the object of her nightmares, had sprinted through the still-crowded Diagon Alley, receiving many curious glances as she passed. Until she had been sprinting for so long that her lungs felt as though they were about to burst.

Turning one last corner, just as the final rays of sun disappeared over the tops of the buildings around her, Lilah collapsed in a heap on the dirty ground of a back alley. She sat there and cried; cried with confusion...cried with anger...cried with dispair. She cried at the thought of the look of complete and utter power as she sat beneath him; cried with confusion at why he would let her breakdown on his chest; cried with despair as she relived the death of her parents again.

She sat there and cried for what seemed like aeons, long after the sky had darkened and numerous stars had emerged and twinkled at her from their perch on the black velvet of night. When finally the tears stopped, and her eyes ran dry, she stood up, not noticing the mud on the bottom of her skirt and up the front of her legs from the position she had been sitting in.

_Oh Merlin,_ she thought._ I probably look as though i've just been hit by the Hogwarts Express._ As she passes the countless windows on her way back to the shop, where Will would no doubt be waiting there for her, she finally saw what she looked like. It wasn't as bad as she thought. In fact, it was _worse_. She inwardly gasped at her current appearance, and the resemblance it held to when she woke up haunted by nightmares.

_Merlin's fucking balls._

She swore inwardly and quickly cast a glamour charm over herself, making it appear as though she had never even left the shop.

By the time she had reached the shop, it must have been well past midnight. Will was sitting in a chair by the door, a book in his hand, half asleep, as though what was inside had bored him. When the bell above the door rang to signal the entrance of a person, he jumped up, dropped the book to the floor and rushed towards Lilah.

"Dear Merlin, Lilah. I thought that you had gone for good there, you even left your things art the book at the desk...do you have any idea how worried I was about you when you just ran off, crying?" This little speech caused Lilah to tear up again, and her concentration over the glamour began to wane. She hated having people worry about her. "I mean seriously, Lilah-"

As soon as Will started to continue on his little guilt trip worry speech, Lilah's control over her glamour snapped altogether. Will instantly noticed the change, as the normally bright and bubbly face in front of him changed from pale and lifeless to tear-stained, muddy and red. Even the state of her clothing was different. She looked like she had gone 3 rounds with a dragon.

"Lilah, are you ok?"

This simple question caused her to lose all sense of normality, and she burst into tears once more. Will, being the kind-hearted yet clueless man that he was, pulled the crying woman into a tight hug, letting her drown her sorrows on his shoulder.

After what seemed like millennia, the flow of tears stopped, and the sobs started to subside. By the time that she was still, she had fallen asleep in his arms, her breathing steady and even, and her face calm and peaceful.

_If only she was like this more often,_ Will thought carrying Lilah outside the shop and apparating to her apartment, like he had done to check up on her when she was sick with dragon pox two and a half years ago. He walked through the house, and came to her bedroom, where he gently placed her down on her bed, wishing her a good night's sleep.

After he had apparated away, Lilah unconsciously wriggled under the blankets of her bed. Finding them to be uncomfortable like the night before, she half-woke and got up off the bed. She walked over to the chair she slept in after waking from her nightmares and wrapped the blanket that was always there around herself.

Just before she fell asleep, one final coherent thought passed through her head.

_If only life was as easy as reading a book._

**Author's Note: Wow! 2 in 2 days :D Go me! As always, a shout out to my beta, and just so you readers are on the same page (leans in close) she is a queer child. Anyways, review and let me know what you think**

**Until next time, as always**

**MFM**


	5. Questioning

**Bought from Hate**

_**By MyFiniteMercy**_

_Dedicated to My Endless Love... for her wonderful influence in my life_

**Summary:** After her parents were murdered 15 years ago, Lilah has hated the man that killed them ever since. But will an unexpected encounter make her doubt her feelings, and cause new ones to stir?

**Disclaimer:** All recognisable characters belong to JK Rowling. Lilah and the plot belong to me. :D

**Author's note: i've changed a couple of things since i uploaded this chapter for the first time... a generous reviewer pointed out some silly errors that I had made, so I quickly fixed them up! Cookies to DZMom for the kind notes.**

**Chapter 5: Questioning**

Lilah awoke with a start. She found herself in her flat once again – in the chair in her room by the window, surrounded by the warm quilt she always kept there. She had no recollection of how she had got there; the last thing she remembered was her glamour snapping, and the sobs returning.

_Damn … I must have fallen asleep on Will. That will look great for future reference. It was nice of him to bring me back here though._

She got up off the chair, and stretched her stiff muscles. Last night was the first night of unbroken sleep in … she didn't even know how long it had been since the nightmares had started, disturbing her sleep with their horrific images. However, even with the traumatic events of the previous day still plaguing her thoughts, she felt more rested and relaxed than she had in years. The sleep had been dreamless.

However, she was baffled as to how Will knew that she slept in the chair. Maybe it was an act of chance.

When she glanced over her shoulder to check the time, the glaring red numbers read 8:18. Perfect. It was the right amount of time to have a cleansing shower, eat something and head down to the shop.

Lilah stood up, shaking off the quilt and running her fingers through her hair. She felt the caked mud and dirt in the knotted strands, which only reiterated her need for a hot shower. She padded across the carpet and into the familiar coldness of the bathroom. The normally harsh fluorescent lights were not – probably due to the fact that she only ever used them in the middle of the night when tears blurred her vision and made any form of light seem brighter and harsher. Standing on the cool, white tiles, she slowly stripped off her soiled clothes. She peeled off her stained jeans, followed by her plain cotton panties, and let them pool at her feet. She undid the buttons on the blue blouse, now browning from the dry mud, and slipped it down her arms. She reached around her back and unhooked the clasps on her bra and let the straps slide down her shoulders.

Once she was completely naked, she stepped into the shower and turned on the taps, letting the water heat up before she moved under its stream. When she deemed the water to be at the perfect temperature, she stepped beneath the flow, and let out a pleasured sigh. The water cascaded down her body in rivulets, passing between the mounds that were her breasts, and across her flat, toned stomach. It ran through her hair, slowly rinsing out the mud and dirt, and partially smoothing out the knots. She reached over to the little shelf on the wall to find the bottle of shampoo, to make sure that the dirt was completely gone from the long auburn strands.

But when she opened the bottle, she caught the scent that she only associated with _that_ person. Her shampoo was labelled "Peppermint Heaven." On any other day, she would have used the scent as a way of strengthening her need to find Malfoy and avenge her dead parents … but today, it just served as a way of allowing his face to seep into her mind. Served as a way of calling back all the little voices that had started questioning her back at the shop. She pushed the voices forcefully to the back of her mind, but she allowed the image of his face to remain.

Lilah shook her head, squeezed out some of the soapy liquid onto her hand and rubbed them together under the water until she had produced a fine lather. Her hands made their way into the wet curtain of her hair, and began massaging the soapy bubbles into her scalp, making sure that all of her hair was covered in the substance. His face was still in her mind; pale blonde hair falling in a steady waterfall down his back. Smooth, flawless skin over pronounced cheekbones and a straight nose. Lips … his lips. She imagined they felt like a rose petal.

She gasped in shock. Here she was, in her shower, imagining about all the little details about him. She felt hot, flustered. She could not even begin to describe the torrent of emotions coursing through her veins. She stood back under the water to allow the flow to rinse out the myriad of shampoo from her hair.

Turning off the taps and reaching for the towel she hung on the shower screen, she stepped out of the steam-filled shower, and walked over to the mirror. Glancing up at it, she saw that her face was pink – either from the steam or from her emotions. She dried off the excess moisture from her body and walked back into the bedroom, thinking about what had transpired in the shower. Her thoughts had drifted to Lucius Malfoy, the man who had murdered her parents, who had haunted her dreams every night for fifteen years, who had terrorised her at work not only a day before.

Even with all these things coursing through her mind, even as she got dressed ready for the day, even as she went to the local bakery to buy a bagel, she couldn't bring herself to care.

-.- -.- -.- -.- -.- -.- -.-

Lucius Malfoy appeared on his doorstep with a small "pop" and quickly put his hand on the door frame to maintain his balance. When he had recovered from the dizziness that comes with apparating, he pushed open the door and walked straight through the marble-tiled entrance hall to the first room with a cupboard that held some of his numerous bottles of Firewhiskey.

He momentarily considered taking out a glass for the drink, but didn't, reasoning that he would probably be drinking at least the whole bottle to try and get rid of the headache that plagued his mind, pounding against the confines of his skull and making his vision blur and swim with its severity. A headache this _painful_ did not come from just a trying day. He reasoned that only his encounter with the Freeman girl could cause a headache this severe.

After choosing a bottle of the drink, he walked over to the case where he kept his miniscule collection of Muggle music, along with a record player. He flicked through the dozen or so cases, not finding anything that caught his eye until he reached one that he had not even realised he owned. The cover read: _From a Basement On A Hill - Elliot Smith._ He flipped open the case and took out the disc, placed it in the player and pressed play.

The songs came and went, and Lucius did not really pay attention to any of them, draining his bottle of Firewhiskey. When the sixth song started playing, he had just gotten up to get another bottle when he stopped and actually listened to the lyrics. The mellow tune of Smith's voice and the underlying guitar sounded throughout the vast room.

_I see you're leaving me_

_And taking up with the enemy_

_The cold comfort of the in-between_

_A little less that a human being_

_A little less than a happy high_

_A little less than a suicide_

_The only things that you really tried_

_This is not my life..._

As the verse ended, he realised that the verse fit perfectly with him, his life, his choices. _Leaving me, and taking up with the enemy … it seems as though there is definitely some form of connection with this Elliot Smith … _As the song ended and the next song began to play, he began to move towards the cupboard again while running the lyrics from the verse through his head over and over again. The bottle of liquor found its way into his hand, and as he drank himself into oblivion, all coherent thought began to slip away from the confines of his mind.

**Author's Note: WOW...that was a hard chapter to get out onto paper...until I heard Fond Farewell by Elliot Smith (R.I.P). It was the inspiration for the half with Lucius in it :D**

**Shout out to Amii for betaing this chap as My Endless Love is currently unavailable. 3 you onee-chan :P**

**MFM**


End file.
